Thursday, June 27, 2013

Medical travel in Thailand: How the country sees the future of the industry

Although Thailand is still the number one medical travel destination in the world, it is concerned about the future of medical travel, thinking that the high number of medical travelers and the low cost of medical procedures may not be enough to sustain the continued growth of the industry.

The affordability of medical travel is one of the biggest reasons why more and more people opt to fly overseas for their treatment instead of having their medical procedures done at their home countries. However, using the lower cost of overseas health care to entice people to come to Thailand for medical travel can be dangerous, especially if it prevents hospitals and agents from thinking ahead on how to attract more medical travelers without lowering costs further and sacrificing their profit margins.

As lower profit margins can sometimes mean lower-quality services, Thailand should instead focus on adding more services and maintaining the high quality of medical care without reducing prices or sacrificing their bottom line. A recent Tourism Authority of Thailand survey confirms this. According to the survey, people still put experienced doctors, advanced technology, and high-quality facilities and staff ahead of lower costs.

Steven Lash is the CEO of Satori World Medical, a San Diego company dedicated to providing affordable and high-quality health care to its clients. For more information about the premium medical travel services offered by Satori, visit the Satori website.